Geography 20f: Natural Resources

A review for the unit test on natural resources.

mineral

naturally occuring, pure, non-living substances found in the rocks of earth’s surface.

nonrenewable resource

a resource that can only be used once

renewable resource

a resource that recycles itself unless badly mismanaged

Natural resource

a natural resource is any material provided by the earth that humans might use to make complex usuable products

Benefits of our forests?

Provide a renewable resource of lumber, pulp and paper

Prevent flooding, and erosion

Habitat for wildlife

Cleanses our air

Canada has the___ __most forest in the world with__ %.

third, 42%

% of coniferous forest and deciduous forest in canada forests

63% are coniferous=cone bearing with needles

21% are deciduous+ trees that lose their leaves every year.

The rest are mixed

3 types of harvesting trees

Clear cutting, selective cutting, shelterwood logging

Clear cutting

fast and cheap

remove every tree and leave landscape barren

may cause erosion

Shelterwood logging

involves clear cutting parts of a forest

small groups of seed bearing trees are left to regenerate the area

Selective cutting

harvesting only certain species/trees

little disruption to the environment

costly and time consuming

Threats to our forests

Environment hazards=acid rain, insects(pine beetles), diseases

Forest fires= good for ecosystems, bad when they burn valuable timber

Human causes= over harvesting of our forests

Mineral

a naturally occuring, pure, non-living substance found in the rocks of the earth

most are of little economic value

types of minerals

metallic minerals, fossil fuels, and industrial minerals.

metallic minerals

when refined yield the group of materials that we know as metals

\

Fossil fuels

any substance that can be burned to produce energy

provide majority of the energy for our society

oil and gas are relied upon heavily, formerly it was coal

industrial minerals

non-metallic minerals used by industry and manufacturing.

Minerals that dont fit the description of fossil fuels or mertallic minerals.

Mineral reserves

Canada is ___ largest producer of minerals in the world.

Large deposits of minerals that are economical to mine

3rd

Issues with mining

harmful emissions=pollute the air= acid precipitation

abandoned mines= leave scars on the land, continue to pollute

easy to access reserves are being used up, forcing us to use hard to access reserves in the future.

Our fresh water

% of earth covered by water

% of water that is salt water

% of the % of fresh water is frozen in icecaps, located in ground moisture, etc.

70% of earth covered by water

97\.5% of water that is salt water

70% of the 2.5 % of fresh water is frozen in icecaps, located in ground moisture, etc.